Found in the Parking Lot: F1 Cars Are Cool and All, but Here’s What Fans Drove to the Track [2012 F1 U.S. Grand Prix]

A key cog in the Formula 1 traveling circus is the legion of rich folks that pour money into the sport and its ancillary activities. They must, of course, get to the race and parties somehow, and we ain’t talking about no rental Versa. Every race location is inundated with piles of exotic hardware, and […]

Alexander Stoklosa

Nov 17, 2012

A key cog in the Formula 1 traveling circus is the legion of rich folks that pour money into the sport and its ancillary activities. They must, of course, get to the race and parties somehow, and we ain’t talking about no rental Versa. Every race location is inundated with piles of exotic hardware, and Austin, Texas, is no different, with the parking lots at the Circuit of the Americas having no shortage of high-end metal to complement the F1 cars tearing up the track. But with F1’s large demographic spread, there also were tons of completely normal autos, as well as a metric crapton of pickup trucks—this is Texas, after all. Here are a few of our favorites:

In terms of exotics, an extremely dusty Ferrari 599GTO parked alone in a dirt field made quite an impression. (Rotor wash from helicopters landing 20 yards away on a dirt pad is a recipe for a dusty car—and a dusty C/D editor.) We also spotted a McLaren MP4-12C illegally parked in a handicap spot, a beige Ferrari FF, and a last-generation Audi S3 with Mexican license plates. A stretched Ford F-series Super Duty limousine also caught our eye, as did several military Humvees scattered near the track’s many entrances. An orange Bugatti Veyron was super predictable.

As far as we can tell, the spread of vehicles in the parking lot faithfully mirrors the wildly variable mix of people we’re seeing in and around the track. There seems to be a near-even mix of locals and out-of-towners from places as far-flung as Italy, India, England, and Japan. To see more stuff we found parked outside the track, check out the gallery below: